The train was coming and the engine was still frozen! Surrendering, seeing that the car wouldn't move out of the tracks on time, Bebe tried to remove the seatbelt but she was so nervous she just couldn't, and it didn't contribute: it was stuck! There was nothing she could do but shake in her seat and scream at the top of her lungs.
And her pleas were listened.
She heard a thunderous zooming and someone landed on her side. Mosquito!
"Hurry! Oh, please, hurry up, Mosquito! The train is coming!" Bebe exclaimed.
With all of his strength, the superhero tore the belt constraining the girl with a jerk and freed her. He then lifted her and flew away just in time for the freight train to crush the car as if it was made of cardboard.
"Oh, thank you! Thank you, thank you!" Bebe exclaimed, hugging him, and Clyde could barely hide a delighted smirk.
"Third time this month, miss. You either have a terrible luck..."
Or you are too stupid to keep yourself out of trouble, but he wasn't going to say it. It was not true. Absolutely. She was smart...she was so smart...
"...Or you are really eager to see me..." He purred close to her face.
Bebe giggled, oh, so mischievously.
"Well...You are so busy with all that hero stuff...I have to do something to get your attention..." She admitted, biting her under lip. Clyde noticed she had painted her lips red, put a lot of make up on, and was wearing her prettiest, sexiest dress and perfume. There was no way this was casual.
"Next time you want to see me, just say it. I'll always have time for you."
Bebe seemed to agree. But that was enough talking. She was still shaking out of fear, he had to stay with her and calm her down, with a snuggle, a kiss, a good making out session...
Urgh! Too bad his bracelet started to beep, informing him that the Freedom Pals assembled, right when their lips were about to touch!
"Oh, uh, sorry, precious. Not today. South Park needs me." Clyde regretted to say, leaving her on the ground.
"Oooh! But I will see you again soon, right?" Bebe protested, looking at him with Bambi eyes.
"I promise."
He wasn't that much in a hurry as to leave without a little peck in the lips...After that, he flew away.
And now that Bebe couldn't see him, he was free to let out a pretty dumb-looking giggle and blush all he wanted.
He had dreamed about Bebe being mad about him since Elementary. And when he told her who he actually was...She wouldn't talk about Clyde Donovan, from school, and just say he was that kid whose father had a shoe shop at the mall. She would have to admit he was pretty cool, not some jerk who never matured, and she would...
Hmm...Should he really tell her?
Nah. Why? Not any time soon, anyway. They could keep the mystery going for a little while.
"Look! It's Mosquito!"
He looked down, at the town underneath him. People in the streets saw him, pointed at him, and took pictures, screamed his name, wooed, begged him to sign autographs. He saw children and grown-ups too with t-shirts and accessories with his face and the Freedom Pals logo—made by themselves, he supposed, although he knew there were people who profited from their image. "Mosquito, Mosquito!" they acclaimed him. He saw former teachers and classmates, neighbors, people who in his daily life ignored him or took him for a simple guy who worked as a cook in a restaurant and liked to have a beer from time to time, a basic man...He waved hello to all of them and kept flying until he reached the forest.
If there was one good thing about Butters losing his mind and causing a massacre at the underpants gnomes' headquarters underground, it was that they looked for a different location and the Freedom Pals had this new place available for their own use. They had had enough renting a unit for practicing and discussing their plans. Nobody but them knew where it was, and it was wide enough for all of them. They just had to reinforce the pillars so no accident buried them and made all of South Park collapse. They had equipped it with everything they could need and the truth was that it was a great place to do their work with no fear of being caught.
"...My dad wants me to be a lawyer like him, but I'll be damned if I want to be in an office from 9 to 5." Ike was telling the rest of the guys, who were having a nice chatter to make time until Clyde showed up. "I want to be a gamer. An influencer, perhaps."
Wendy giggled and felt that someone was touching her arm, getting her attention. Timmy.
["Wendy?"] He said telepathically.
"Oh, hi, Timmy. What's up?" She asked.
["Is everything alright?"]
"Yes, why?"
["I wouldn't dare invade a lady's privacy, and less yours, after what Gregory made me do to you, but I have been getting a big distress coming from your mind..."]
Wendy's smile faded a bit. "It's nothing."
He was staring at her in a way that made her so uncomfortable.
[..."You are blocking me. I respect that. But I still want you to know I'm here if you need anything, okay?"]
After what Gregory made him do to her...Yes, Timmy had been hesitant to use his powers with his partners for a while, even just the telepathic communication, after being forced by her ex-boyfriend to take over their minds and use them like puppets. But he meant good. He was a friend. Wendy knew. He had also had to deal with the burden of a secret...He sure know how difficult that was...
"Thank you, Timmy." She smiled, taking his hand tenderly.
"Timmy..." He replied, caressing it.
"Sorry, guys. Here I am." Clyde put his wings away and greeted Token with a fist bump. "How you doing, man?"
"Good, now that we're all here..." Ike walked to the big screen presiding the space. "It is not really a threat, but it is still a mission. No pressure, though."
He pressed a button on the device in his hand and the screen showed the face of a young man with long hair, up to twenty-six inches, with green highlights, dressed with a leather jacket and a fishnet shirt under it, pale like a corpse.
"Wait. I know that guy." Kenny said, changing his posture in his seat. "He's Mike Makowski. The freak who went around pretending he was a vampire back at Elementary."
"Exactly, but unlike most of his friends—if not all—, his freakness didn't disappear when he grew up, but increased, even. Wendy, if you please."
Wendy blinked and the screen showed an article she had found with her mind.
"As soon as he reached eighteen, he underwent surgery to reshape his canine teeth and make them real fangs. Later, an otoplasty for pointy ears, and eye color surgery to make them red." Ike continued. "He was in the press last month for allegedly feeding on blood, mostly."
Kyle shook his head disapprovingly and Craig looked at him with an eyebrow raised.
"You became a trans-black basketball player in fourth grade, dude." He said.
"I know it was silly! I know! That's why I don't like it!" Kyle replied, crossing his arms.
"I am getting tweets and Youtube videos of a vampire wandering the streets of South Park at night, harassing people out of the bars, out of work, trying to bite them..." Wendy said, blinking fast, processing the info she was getting from the cloud, the screen showing flashes of said posts.
"So he thinks he's a real vampire?" Scott muttered.
"Or maybe he's just a fetishist and scaring people excites him." Token said. "Remember the plague of killing clowns last Christmas?"
"Any injured or killed?" Kyle asked.
"I have found none of that." Wendy replied after a fast search.
"No, he didn't get to actually harm anyone. Or at least the complaints Barbrady got were about harassment and tussle. But it is still a creep everybody wants to get rid of, and the town trusts you to find him and send him to the madhouse he belongs to." Ike said.
There was really nothing more to say. It was a calm day, with no emergencies. Before leaving, the group had the time to talk about their day, or just leave to attend their own business, like Scott and Timmy did.
"Heh. Look at this. The senator for Colorado came to town, Cartman tried to give him head and he got arrested!" Kyle showed his partners a video on his phone, and the others were glad to watch and laugh at that asshole who had to have his stomach congested with cum at that point.
And while they did, Jimmy approached Wendy.
"So? Any n-n-news about your little co-co-concern?"
"I went to the pharmacy on my way here...I've got a test in my purse..." Wendy replied. "But I don't know if I should tell Stan, really..."
"I-I think you should. You don't want to w-wait till you're in la-labor..."
"Who's in labor?" Stan approached, wrapping his arms around Wendy's waist. He didn't notice her looking away, her breath stopping for a second.
"Just a jo-joke I'm working on for my next performance, pal. A seahorse gi-giving birth."
"Oh. Tell me, now I'm curious." Stan said.
"N-Nah, Wendy's right: the pu-p-punchline's shit, I gotta wo-work on it. See ya!" And he dashed away from that awkward situation.
Stan turned then to Wendy and kissed her. "My mom asked me if we wanted to have dinner at my parents' house tonight. I don't know, I'm a bit more in the mood for pizza, a movie and a snuggle."
Just the thought of pizza made Wendy sick...
"Oh, no, we have to go. We haven't seen them in a while; she'll think that I am stealing her boy." She smiled. "Come on, we can snuggle after that..."
"Promise?" Stan smiled, and Wendy thought...would he smile that way when she told him...
A notification popped up while Kyle was showing a few more images of Cartman being a slut.
"Hey, what's that?" Clyde smirked.
"Nothing." Kyle tried to put his phone back to his pocket, but Token stole it from him and teleported to the other side of the room. "Hey!"
"Heidi wants to see him!" Token informed the others.
"That's private!" Kyle flew to get his phone, and Token teleported again away from him.
"And includes four face blowing a kiss emojis!"
"Oh! That means business!" Clyde smirked.
"Are you dating Heidi? Again?" Tweek asked with a side smile.
"No!" Kyle replied, getting to get his phone back.
"Yes, you are, man. He's like 'Oooh, Heidi, you look so pretty, muac, muac'!" Ike jumped in, making a lot of dumb faces.
"Have you been spying on me, you little prick?!" Kyle complained, hitting his brother in the head.
"I am your manager! I have to know where you are! And Kenny has, too!" Ike replied.
"I tell you everything and you never tell me anything, dude! I gotta find things out myself!" Kenny complained with a frown and no remorse at all.
"For how long? I thought you guys..." Tweek asked.
"Five months or so...I didn't say anything because we're going slow but...It's not like we were kids. This time I think it's definitive. Now that we're both mature and with Cartman just concerned about people's groins and his own, there's nothing between us." Kyle said, and he couldn't help smiling.
They talked about school romances like children...
...In the same town, not too far away from there, some children didn't play like the other kids their age. They didn't have the time for that. For the sake of those who didn't have the chance to be children all around the world, the poor, the oppressed, the non-privileged, they dedicated their free time to make the world a better place.
Emory looked at the stats of their latest Youtube video, "CALL GIRL SPIES ON US!", and frowned a little. Three hundred seventy two likes, fourty nine thousand one dislikes. Harper looked over his shoulder and read the comment someone had left just a few seconds before.
"Another slur against mentally challenged people..." Harper sighed.
"So another block." River said, and took the tablet from her brother's hands and did it herself.
"Why won't they be nice for once?" Harper crossed his arms and shook his head.
"People really don't see how harmful their use of language is." Riley said.
"And people like these don't help." Bailey nodded.
"Right. Have you heard them talk when they save the town? The other day, when Fastpass fought those armed men entrenched at Whole Foods, they recurred to the r-word to say they were fool, using fire weapons against him, when they could have used any other term!" River said. "Our lives are in the hands of people who don't have any sensibility!"
They had tried to raise awareness, but it felt like preaching in the wilderness. Everyone was mad about the Freedom Pals. People defended them to death. They were considered a gift from heaven. Their videos and tweets rarely received a good review. There was always someone trying to convince them that they were good. In that last video, for instance, and in spite of all arguments they provided about Call Girl having access to everything online, personal data even, the comments were all negative (all except one which was clickbait and another one which sounded like someone just bumped their head against the keyboard). How dared they call Call Girl a spy? She had done more in life than they would in thirteen. She was fantastic. She was super. She was an icon. And the same happened when they called Wonder Tweek out for hitting a woman (who was threatening to kill her own child with a kitchen knife), Human Kite for treating a Pride flag like a rag during an assault at a gay pub, Toolshed for reinforcing gender stereotypes using tools as a weapon, Tupperware using non biodegradable materials for their suit...
But they knew reason and justice was with them, and they wouldn't surrender until South Park, the whole world, saw them like they did...
Harper sighed, then stood up on the bed in a much more cheerful way. "Don't say down! We are David fighting Goliath! We just have to be patient!""
"Yeah! That's right!" His siblings agreed.
"We just have to educate people." Riley said.
A new notification popped up. The children quickly gathered back together to read.
"A DM!" Emory muttered.
River opened the Private Messages window, praying it was not another idiot insulting them. She read it aloud:
"Hello. Your investigations are really interesting. Congratulations. You have convinced me. I have proof that the Freedom Pals are not what they seem and I am glad someone has the courage to speak out loud. Don't get discouraged if people react negatively. The Freedom Pals have done a great job deceiving them. But the good thing is that these double-faced people can't keep their masks on forever. You just have to find the proper situation and they will expose themselves the way they really are. For instance, I know for a fact that one or two who really can't resist lady's charm. Thank you for your work again, I wish you the best. M.C."
"We got a supporter!" Riley exclaimed in glee.
"See? We just have to be patient!" Harper smiled.
River took a moment to write a kind response to this M.C. fellow. Whoever this man, woman or non-binary was, they had really given them the push they needed.
"They are right, you know?" Bailey said, his hand on his chin in thought.
"What do you mean?" Emory asked.
"If we can't convince people with arguments, we have to make them see how terrible the Freedom Pals are."
"We have already exposed their awful behavior, but they won't listen." Riley said.
"...Maybe we have to set a trap to them..." Bailey looked at each one of his siblings, eyebrows furrowed.
They exchanged a glance, then looked at the comment again.
'For instance, I know for a fact that one or two who really can't resist lady's charm'
They knew who was perfect for the task...
Once again, they crossed the doors of Raisins...
Raisins' owners had changed in the last years. Former workers Lexus, Mercedes, Porsche and Ferrari had earned enough money with tips that once they reached adulthood they bought the restaurant and made a few changes. Girls aged nine and ten kept working there, attracting the youngest male customers, but they also expanded the business to the adults. Around midnight, when the youngest finished their shift, it was their turn to please the adult eye turning the restaurant into a bar, open till sunrise, with a dance show every hour. With their experience and natural charms, Raisins was more popular than ever.
Of course, the PC children were not going to keep their arms crossed at such denigration. Many times they had protested at the door, even sued them for their provocative uniforms, their abhorrent sexualization and objectification of girls and women. But, of course, this was a patriarchy and the judges kept Raisins open, and they had been declared 'non-grata', as if they wanted to eat at such hole of perversion!
But now they needed the girls...
"Hi, welcome to...!" As always, a girl with her face full of make up greeted them with a joyful voice, a voice that lost all of its enthusiasm when she recognized them. "Oh, it's you. You're not welcome here."
"We know, but we need to talk to one of the managers." River said, trying not to look around. Seeing all those boys drooling over a girl made her inner feminist scream.
"We are too busy to listen to your whining." The girl protested.
"It's not that. Please. It is important." Bailey said.
The Raisins girl sighed.
"Okay, this way."
She took them to the office. It was evident that the workers didn't like them, because everywhere they went they got awful looks. One of the owners, Mercedes, who at that moment was on the phone ("Don't worry, Bunny, dear! Mommy will be there for your good night tale! Be good to grandpa! I love you too, sweetheart!"), covered the receiver and demanded the waitress to take them out immediately, glaring at them.
They finally reached where the others were, at the back of the building. The girl made them wait outside, while she announced their coming. The PC children heard a short argument inside, it seemed the owners were not convinced about their intentions, but in the end an adult, female voice told them to come in, and the waitress went back to work.
The rest of the owners, with uniforms so short it almost seemed they had been wearing the same attire they used to wear when they were ten, greeted them with frowns and arms crossed.
"Well? What, this time?" Lexus asked.
"We come in peace." River spoke first.
"Do you? That's nice, after coming here to shout that this place is a brothel..."
It was a brothel, River wanted to shout, but this was not the time.
"We didn't come here to talk about that. We need you...We need your...uhm...charms." Emory said.
"Didn't you say that we were objectifying ourselves, that we were...what his exact words were, girls?" Lexus asked.
"Prostitutes." Ferrari frowned.
"That." Lexus grunted.
"...We want to expose the Freedom Pals and we think they can go mad with you. We need you to flirt a bit with them and let us take photos." Bailey said.
"Freedom Pals? Why would you do such thing?" Ferrari asked.
"We have nothing against Freedom Pals, kids. We can't help you." Porsche said.
"Yes. They understand that we are just women who want to earn a buck with their bodies, just like the supermodels...or whatever whales the likes of you have put in the fashion industry..." Lexus said. "You can go now."
"...Okay, since all you want is earn a buck, why don't you think of it this way?" Emory said then. "If a superhero has laid a hand on you, you can earn a lot of money talking about it on the television. It would be one heck of a publicity, because all these men will want to be your knights in shining armor..."
It seemed it worked, the PC children observed with relief. The women exchanged a look.
"So, what do you say?" Harper asked, tilting his head.
Mercedes came into the room and seemed honestly surprised to find them there.
"What are you kids doing here? We said we didn't want you near us!" She complained.
"No, Mercedes." Lexus muttered, looking at her partners. "The kids brought us a good idea, for a change..."
Wasn't this prostitution too, using a woman's body for a profit? No, the PC children said to themselves—not if they used it for a really honest cause.